D. Telekom, Vodafone, others want U.S. tech giants to help fund network costs
28/11/2021 23:00
By Foo Yun Chee
BRUSSELS, Nov 29 (Reuters) - U.S. tech giants should bear
some of the costs of developing Europe's telecoms networks
because they use them so heavily, chief executives of Deutsche
Telekom DTEGn.DE , Vodafone VOD.L and 11 other major European
telecoms companies said on Monday.
The call by the CEOs comes as the telecoms industry faces
massive investments for 5G, fibre and cable networks to cope
with data and cloud services provided by Netflix NFLX.O and
Google's GOOGL.O YouTube and Facebook FB.O .
Investments in Europe's telco sector rose to 52.5 billion
euros ($59.4 billion) last year, a six-year high.
"A large and increasing part of network traffic is generated
and monetized by big tech platforms, but it requires continuous,
intensive network investment and planning by the
telecommunications sector," the CEOs said in a joint statement
seen by Reuters.
"This model – which enables EU citizens to enjoy the fruits
of the digital transformation – can only be sustainable if such
big tech platforms also contribute fairly to network costs,"
they said.
The CEOs did not mention any tech firms by name, but Reuters
understands that U.S.-listed giants such as Netflix and Facebook
are companies they have in mind.
Signatories to the letter include the CEOs of Telefonica
TEF.MC , Orange ORAN.PA , KPN KPN.AS , BT Group BT.L ,
Telekom Austria TELA.VI , Vivacom, Proximus PROX.BR , Telenor
TEL.OL , Altice Portugal, Telia Company TELIA.ST and Swisscom
SCMN.S .
The CEOs also criticised high spectrum prices and auctions,
used by EU governments as cash cows, saying that these
artificially force unsustainable entrants into the market.
EU lawmakers' attempts to scrap surcharges on intra-EU calls
also got short shrift from the CEOs who see this sector as a
source of revenue from business users.
"We estimate that they would forcibly remove over 2 billion
euros revenues from the sector in a 4 year period, which is
equivalent to 2.5% of the sector's yearly investment capacity
for mobile infrastructure," the companies said.
EU lawmakers have to discuss their proposal with EU
countries before it can be adopted and may struggle to find
agreement.
($1 = 0.8839 euros)
(Reporting by Foo Yun Chee; Editing by Toby Chopra)
((foo.yunchee@thomsonreuters.com; +32 2 287 6844; Reuters
Messaging: foo.yunchee.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))